The state chronicle. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1883-1893, 1887-03-24
VOL. XVII.
SOME REFLECTIONS
OccasiOned by a Trip ThI Ough the Great
North.

When DR.. Franklin wrote his maXims for
making money. he found every Yankee
heart responding to the music of his Poor
Richard Almanac. Money increased and
so did the love of it. At last came the
Confederate war. Liberal bounties, high
wages, pay for substitutes, confsd on
and plumber attracted thousands, VVl1lle
those who remained at home held lucra-
tive offices and fattened on government
contracts. Success made their paper mon
ey as good as gold. l rode through Wes-
tern State some time ago, with an Indiana
farmer, who said: "When our soldiers
came home, their pockets were full and
they did not know what to do with their
money" The war ended more than twenty
years ago. Yet Congress is still voting
pensions, and contracts, and liberal appro-
priations for Soldiers, Orphan Asylums,
Soldiers Homes, and Hospitals. OF course
the Northern States are still full of money.
In the South, all our money and most of
our property was lost. No fat contracts,
no pensions and very scanty appropria-
tions. Besides, our people are still raking
up all the money they can get to send
zers, wagons, and the very mill-stOnes
quarried in the South. If any money is
not sent, peddlers go around and gather it
up.
So then the Northern people are rich
and prosperous, while we are compare
lively poor. But have their riches made
them any better2 They are not happy,
nor contented. Solomon was rich and he
tried in vain to be happy. He grew in
wealth, but not in grace. His last record
ed words contradict the promises of his
early manhood. His life is a warning to
all who desire to be rich. Northern church
es are monuments of magnifcence, but
the poor are practically driven away, and
the rich are fed on the promises made to
the Jewish theocracy which are not intend
ed for sinners of our day. At church in
st. Pauls 1 did not hear any ''comeye-
sinner sermons; but the texts were taken
from the Old Testament, and our conscl-
enceS were plastered over with promises
of good things in this world In Cincin-
natl entered a church at the hour for
Sunday School. A man stood on the plat
form and seemed to be talking. He was
opening with a prayer to which no one
listened. Yet, when l made the acqualn-
tance of the pastor, l found him gifted
and consecrated, one of the noblest of all
mankind, DR.. Jeffery.
In Philadelphia was put into a Sunday
School class. The teacher was good old
ignoramus. When l quoted Scripture to
to the pastor, who said he had never
heard or read anything on that point"
Before the school was over, a Sunday
drummer mistOOk me for a merchant and
tried to sell me some goods.
In St. Paul l was escorted to pew
priced on an envelope at $50. When the
minister said, ''Let US pray it seemed
that he was committee of one to wait on
the Lord, while others took no part in the
exercise. Any man seemed to be ready
for the church, if he would consent to go
to heaven, when he could not stay any
longer in Minnesota. Even at a prayer
meeting, young man tried to pray while
a D. D. sat unconcerned. Still there are
many thousands of good people In the
North, very pious, liberal and always ready
for every good work, but strangers do not
always meet them. They are always meek
and never obtrusive 1t seems to me that
our poverty has done US good has kept Us
out of many sins, snares and temptations.
The curse of pensions has not been vls-
tied on US. 1t is manly for man to make
a living, even if he was once soldier. 1t
takes the manhood out of a man to make
him a recipient of charity when he does
not need it. In the Washington Work
House asked man how he came there.
He said, 81 got on SPREE" Then an
officer explained: every month that
man draws $65, and marches to a grog
shop and stays till his money is gone and
he is put in the street. Then we take him
and feed hIm till time to draw his money
again. So we have him two thirds of his
time" Such illustrations could be indeti-
nitely multiplied.
In one particular the Northern people
ara far ahead of us. We look upon gov
ernment as intended for the wicked only.
Hence we have neither chaplain, nor mis-
sionary to prisoners and convicts. Very
few of our l.astors visit poor houses and
jails A man guilty of the sin of being a
pauper is usually fed on one-fourth of
what is given to rogue or robber IN
jail We have no reformatories, no schools
for feeble minded children, no industrial
schools for erring and wayward girls.
The Northern States have their wealthy
(male and female) philanthropists who
freely give their time and money to reform
delinquents and to relieve every form of
suffering. They attach cash value to
every citizen and to every boy and girl
With them children are worth more when
properly trained. HeEce their public
schools, reformatories, industrial schools,
cooking schools, sewing schools and train
ing schools for nurses, are parts OF politl-
cal economy. Hence also their unpaid
Boards of Charity and inspectors of pub
lie charities. These boards and inspectors
are experts and they usually make thor
ough work of their inspections.
We once had Board of Charities com
posed in part of men whose work was to
be inspected. Their Secretary was the
manager of large public charity. But
the Act creating the Board (ratlfed IN
1863, is a sensible document, as far as 1t
goes. The report contains some gush,
some preaching, some old temperance
speeches and some valuable information.
Instead of printing reports of disinterest-
ed inspectors, the Board allowed County
Commissioners to report on their own
poor houses. Did any one ever see Coun-
ty Commissioner who (after eating one of
the overseer's big dinners) could be con-
vinced that his poor-hOuse was not next
door to paradise? Their second report
enumerates the causes of crime and pau
perism. Among these are enumerated
grog shops, Ignorance, idleness, brothels,
gambling hells, poverty, perniclous books,
pauperism, want of economy, extrava-
gance, speculation, &c. Such tangled
enumeration is fair index to the discus
sions under each head. Still, if the Board
had been continued, by this time it might
have learned to do efficient work, and our
institutions would have been in better con-
dilion. Our legislators would have known
what laws and appropriations were wise
and needfuI.